Songwriter Ray Evans, 92; three tunes won Oscars

Ray Evans, 92, whose long collaboration with songwriting partner Jay Livingston produced a string of hits that included the Oscar-winning "Buttons and Bows," "Mona Lisa" and "Whatever Will Be, Will Be (Que Sera, Sera)," has died.

Mr. Evans, who met Livingston at the University of Pennsylvania and teamed with him in the late 1930s, died Thursday of an apparent heart attack at the University of California, Los Angeles Medical Center, said Frederick Nicholas, Mr. Evans' lawyer and the trustee of his estate.

Considered among Hollywood's greatest songwriters, Mr. Evans and Livingston wrote for dozens of movies, most of them at Paramount, where they were under contract from 1945 to 1955. Livingston died in 2001 at 86.

With Livingston providing the melodies and Mr. Evans the lyrics, the team wrote 26 songs that reportedly sold more than one million copies each.

With Livingston, Mr. Evans "gave us some of the most enduring songs in the great American songbook," lyricist Alan Bergman said. "We will miss him but know that his songs will live on."

Mr. Evans and Livingston earned four other Oscar nominations - for "The Cat and the Canary" from Why Girls Leave Home (1945); "Tammy," sung by Debbie Reynolds in Tammy and the Bachelor (1957); "Almost in Your Arms" from Houseboat (1958); and the title song for Dear Heart (1964).

"Dear Heart," with lyrics credited to Mr. Evans and Livingston and music by Henry Mancini, became a big hit for Andy Williams.

Among the duo's songs, which reportedly have sold nearly 500 million copies, is the Christmas standard "Silver Bells." Introduced in the 1951 Bob Hope-Marilyn Maxwell comedy, The Lemon Drop Kid, "Silver Bells" is said to have been recorded by nearly 150 artists and has sold more than 160 million copies.

Mr. Evans and Livingston also wrote the memorable themes for the TV series Bonanza and Mr. Ed.

The son of a dealer in secondhand paper, string and burlap, Mr. Evans was born in Salamanca, N.Y. After graduating from high school, where he played clarinet in the band and was valedictorian, Mr. Evans earned a degree in economics at Penn's Wharton School. While there, he met Livingston, a journalism major from McDonald, Pa., who had studied piano as a child.

Mr. Evans joined Livingston's band, which played college dances and parties, and during school vacations they played together in cruise-ship bands.

After graduating in 1937, Mr. Evans and Livingston worked on cruise ships before moving to New York City, where they began their songwriting collaboration.

The two picked up their first Oscar for the bouncy "Buttons and Bows," which Hope introduced in the 1948 comedy Western, The Paleface, and was recorded by Dinah Shore, among others. In 1951, they won the Oscar for "Mona Lisa," from Captain Carey, U.S.A.

After leaving Paramount to work as freelancers in 1955, Mr. Evans and Livingston won their third Oscar for "Whatever Will Be, Will Be (Que Sera, Sera)," which Doris Day sang in Alfred Hitchcock's 1956 thriller The Man Who Knew Too Much.

The duo also wrote the music and lyrics for two Broadway musicals, Oh Captain! in 1958 (a Tony nominee for best musical) and Let It Ride in 1961. In 1979, two of their songs were included in the hit Broadway revue Sugar Babies.

In later years, the songwriting team provided special material for Hope and charity shows.

Mr. Evans, whose wife, Wyn, died in 2003, is survived by his sister, Doris Feinberg.